OAKLAND: A PLAGUE OF KILLING / CITYS HOMICIDES AFFECT LITTLE ONES IN BIG WAYS / Children who lose a parent are angry, confused, in pain

Jim Herron Zamora, Chronicle Staff Writer

Published
4:00 am PST, Thursday, December 28, 2006

Destiny Quintero and her mother Elizabeth visit her father Anthony "Jimmy" Quintero, who worked for Brinks security, who was killed in Sept. 29, 2006 in Oakland, at the ceremery, Sunday Nov. 19, 2006, (Lacy Atkins/The Chronicle) (Lacy Atkins/The Chronicle) (Lacy Atkins/The Chronicle) MANDATORY CREDITFOR PHOTGRAPHER AND SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE/ -MAGS OUT less

Destiny Quintero and her mother Elizabeth visit her father Anthony "Jimmy" Quintero, who worked for Brinks security, who was killed in Sept. 29, 2006 in Oakland, at the ceremery, Sunday Nov. 19, 2006, (Lacy ... more

Photo: Lacy Atkins

Photo: Lacy Atkins

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Destiny Quintero and her mother Elizabeth visit her father Anthony "Jimmy" Quintero, who worked for Brinks security, who was killed in Sept. 29, 2006 in Oakland, at the ceremery, Sunday Nov. 19, 2006, (Lacy Atkins/The Chronicle) (Lacy Atkins/The Chronicle) (Lacy Atkins/The Chronicle) MANDATORY CREDITFOR PHOTGRAPHER AND SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE/ -MAGS OUT less

Destiny Quintero and her mother Elizabeth visit her father Anthony "Jimmy" Quintero, who worked for Brinks security, who was killed in Sept. 29, 2006 in Oakland, at the ceremery, Sunday Nov. 19, 2006, (Lacy ... more

Photo: Lacy Atkins

OAKLAND: A PLAGUE OF KILLING / CITYS HOMICIDES AFFECT LITTLE ONES IN BIG WAYS / Children who lose a parent are angry, confused, in pain

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Mykaael O'Brien has nightmares that people are shooting at him. Precious Brewer sometimes sees her father's face when looking at strangers. Destiny Quintero sees the moon and says it's her daddy smiling at her.

All three are children who have lost a parent or close relative to homicide in Oakland.

So is Jalen Bryant, who spent six weeks mourning a close cousin's death before another relative was killed last week. Asha Parvins had chilling nightmares about her uncle's death for four years, but "now I only have sad dreams."

Victim advocates estimate that for every person killed in a homicide -- there have been 148 in Oakland so far this year, compared with 94 last year -- there is at least one child who has lost a parent.

Kids scarred by the loss respond in different ways.

"Many children just close down, and they give you very little to work with," said Berkeley therapist Lenora Poe, who has counseled more than 250 children of homicide victims in the past 23 years. "It can take a long time to draw them out and help them deal with their loss. These children are angry, confused and in a lot of pain. They often blame themselves when a parent is killed. It's really true that these homicides destroy much more than one person."

These kids often are raised solely by the remaining parent, a grandparent or an aunt, an arrangement that can present additional stresses for the caretaker, said Poe, who also facilitates a support group for custodial grandparents, including many raising the children of homicide victims.

"They are faced with a double whammy," Poe said. "I see many grandparents who take over the parenting role while they are still grieving. They don't have time to grieve, and they feel like they have to put their feelings aside to help the kids."

Ericka Byrd, 24, knows that pull between dealing with her own numbing grief and trying to be strong for her two children, who mourn their father differently.

"I have a lot of trouble sleeping. My poor son has nightmares," Byrd said. "I feel helpless in this situation."

Byrd's longtime boyfriend, Michael O'Brien, was shot to death Aug. 19 in his old neighborhood just east of Lake Merritt. An aspiring songwriter, O'Brien left behind 8-year-old son Mykaael and 5-year-old daughter Mykaela. O'Brien's son responded by becoming very quiet, having nightmares and sometimes just crying alone. "I miss my best friend," he said.

His sister keeps asking her mother questions, such as: "Why would someone kill my daddy?" In a presentation for her kindergarten, Mykaela said that if she could have just one wish, "I would have another day with my daddy."

"This has been the hardest ... four months of my entire life," Byrd said. "I don't understand their grief. My father is still around. My grief is different. I lost my mate."

Byrd knew the holidays were stressful, so she decided to take a month's leave of absence from work. "I took the children to Disneyland for Christmas," Byrd said. "It was too depressing to spend Christmas at home without Michael." Just before they made the drive to Southern California, they stopped by the cemetery where O'Brien is buried and decorated his grave with Christmas ornaments.

Elizabeth Quintero, 23, also had a lot of fear about how she would get through the holiday season. Her husband, Brink's guard Anthony "Jimmy" Quintero, was killed in a robbery in September. Two suspects have been charged with murder in that case. But her own large family and her in-laws "surrounded us with love," Quintero said. "We weren't alone at all. Christmas went better than I expected."

Destiny, 3, often looks at photos of her father and tells her mother that he is watching them from heaven, which she describes as a place inside the moon.

"She gets on the play phone at day care and says she is talking to her daddy," Quintero said. "Then she hangs up and says that Daddy says he loves her. Every time she talks about him, it's with a smile."

Roniyah Mack, 5, lost her father twice -- to prison and then to homicide -- but she gets a big smile when she speaks of "my daddy in heaven." Ronald Mack Jr. was shot to death Oct. 6, less than two months after his release from state prison. The case remains unsolved.

Roniyah treasures several letters that he wrote to her from prison. In the handwritten notes, he refers to her as "my princess" and "shining star." He promised to care for her. Roniyah keeps the letters in a special purple box and asks grown-ups to read them to her every so often.

Jalen Bryant, 11, had six weeks to mourn the unsolved shooting death of "my best cousin," Wayne Gordon Jr., 18, killed Nov. 4 in East Oakland. "I wish I had one more time to play with him," Jalen said. "I can't believe he got shot. ... I just cried and cried."

Then on Dec. 20, Anthony Johnson, the father of another cousin, was killed and Jalen spent the Christmas weekend helping to console other family members.

"I really didn't want to expose him to this," said his mother, Omesa Ingram, who moved to Pittsburg three years ago from East Oakland. "I feel that to raise a young man, a black man, in Oakland is extremely hard and dangerous. There are too many young men hanging on corners and too much killing."

Christmas was tricky also for Seretha Woodland and Precious Brewer.

Woodland had already moved out of Oakland, partially because of safety concerns, even before her boyfriend, Purnell Brewer Sr., was killed Jan. 18. Their son, Purnell Jr., is now 17 months old.

"I moved again before Christmas," said Woodland, who asked that the East Bay city where she now lives remain unpublished. "I didn't want to spend Christmas in the same house without him. All the memories -- it would just be too hard. I felt like we needed a fresh start."

Woodland also spends most weekends with Purnell Jr.'s half-sister, Precious Brewer, 5, who lives with Brewer's parents in Oakland. Precious said she still has vivid memories of "my daddy" and frequently wonders about him. Woodland tells Precious stories about her father's kindness and sense of humor, but she sometimes has to fight back tears while recounting memories.

Each child and adult may respond differently to trauma, counselors said, and each may respond better to a different treatment.

"In many cases, the whole family should come in and be evaluated," said Dr. Herb Schreier, a psychiatrist at Children's Hospital Oakland who has worked with many kids traumatized by violence. "There's no simple answer. The evaluation has to be done on the whole family system."

Asha Parvins didn't lose a parent, but the unsolved killing of her uncle has haunted her for more than four years. She was 13 when Daniel Knowell was killed in West Oakland on May 5, 2002.

"He was really more like a big brother than an uncle," said Asha. "He was the main role model in my life. I saw him almost every day. He told me how to take care of myself around boys. He warned to 'stay smart' and would get down on me when I messed up."

Asha had nightmares for years. Now a senior at Piedmont High School, she said her dreams about him recently changed: "They are sweet but sad."

"I dream that he is still there, watching me grow up into a woman, making jokes with me," Asha said. "Then I wake up and I realize he's dead. I get real sad."

About the series

With homicides in Oakland at the highest count in more than a decade, The Chronicle is expanding its coverage with a multimedia project that shows the human impact of violence in the city.

The project is the result of more than four months of work, and dozens of people agreed to share their stories. They include the people left behind by the homicides, including the children of those who died, the subject of today's story.

-- Remembering the dead: A list of this year's homicide victims, with profiles, photos, links to articles and audio clips from family members and friends.

-- Mapping the homicides: Interactive graphics show where each of more than 550 homicides in the past five years has occurred, plus the locations of the city's 365 liquor stores, which residents and police have targeted as magnets for crime.

-- Living amid the killing: Residents tell how the violence has affected them, in audio and video reports.

-- Voices of concern: A variety of thoughts about the problem, plus possible solutions.